Bangkok is not a beautiful city. But it is unquestionably a captivating one, exerting an irresistible charm as the epitome of all things Thai. Alec Waugh got it right in his 1970 book on the Thai capital: "Bangkok has been loved," he wrote, "because it is an expression of the Thais themselves, of their lightheartedness, their love of beauty, their reverence for tradition, their sense of freedom, their extravagance, their devotion to their creed -- to characteristics that are constant and continuing in themselves."
The characteristics seem contradictory, but Bangkok is a huge paradox, at once wondrous and woeful. For this it is one of the world's most distinctive cities, a place that fascinates by making innumerable contradictions seem consistent. It is at once chaotic and serene, ancient and modern, sacred and profane, pandering to nouveau riche greed and proudly caring of traditional values... the oddities are as endless as they are real.
The key to understanding Bangkok is to realize that beneath its modern facade it remains unmistakably Thai, traditional and essentially unchanging. Ultimately, the city is simply itself and you have to accept it as such if you are ever going to come to terms with it. The horrendous traffic congestion is perhaps everyone's biggest complaint, but even for those who complain, cars in Thailand are not firstly a means of transport, they are social cachets which once obtained are not to be relinquished lightly.
Traffic congestion is part and parcel of the Bangkok experience, and it is easier to accept when you realize it is not going to change. Nor is it new. There never were any halcyon days before the canals were filled in to make way for paved roads. Here's Queen Victoria's envoy Sir John Bowring on the hazards of Bangkok's then waterborne traffic: "Boats often run against one another, and those within them are submerged in the water...The constant occurrence of petty disasters seems to reconcile everybody to their consequences." That was in the 1850s but the idea of being reconciled to the inevitable hassles of city traffic remains true today.
Located on the banks of the Chao Phraya River, a few kilometres upstream from its outflow into the Gulf of Siam, Bangkok sprawls across a flat alluvial plain. It is the capital in every sense of the word. It is where the Royal Family resides, it is the seat of government and administration, and it is the focal point for virtually all major industrial, commercial and financial activity. It is the country's main port and home to more than one-tenth of the Kingdom's population.
Such an all-important role is reflected in the capital's proper name, Krung Thep. This translates as "City of Angels" and is the first in a whole string of illustrious titles that properly define the place -- and, incidentally, earn a listing in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's longest place name. To the Thais Bangkok is always Krung Thep, the spiritual and symbolic as well as physical heart of the nation.
And yet Bangkok is a comparatively young city. A riverine village and customs post until the late 18th century, it was founded as the national capital in 1782 by King Rama I. Initially the city was intended to parallel the lost glory of Ayutthaya, the previous capital destroyed by the Burmese, and was accordingly developed as an island city with a web of canals. Palaces and temples in classical architecture were the only substantial buildings; houses and other structures were made of wood.
Change came in the mid 19th century when King Mongkut, Rama VI, ordered the building of the first roads for wheeled traffic. In the same reign, Bangkok was embarked on the path of commerce with the signing of international trade agreements. A pattern of modernization and commercialization along largely Western lines has been followed ever since.
Today most of the canals have been filled in to make way for roads, and the city has expanded far away from the Chao Phraya river, thereby losing its original focal point and abandoning any semblance of a downtown area.
In the last few decades the pace of growth has been rapid. First in the 1950s and '60s rows of functional but drab concrete shop houses began changing the face of city then, in the 1980s and '90s, came concrete-and-glass high-rises.
Today, Bangkok appears as a modern, dynamic metropolis bustling with today's business. The skyline is dominated by thrusting office towers, high-rise condominiums, luxury hotels, department stores and shopping malls. But this is just one aspect of Bangkok. Joyfully exuberant, the city embraces latter-day developments though, surprisingly, modern building does not obliterate a wealth of monuments to traditional glories.
In the soaring roofs and tapering gilded spires of the Grand Palace, Temple of the Emerald Buddha, Temple of Dawn and the rest of Bangkok's more than 400 Buddhist temples, you are presented with images of awe-inspiring Oriental splendour. Contained within such monuments are masterpieces of sculpture, painting and decorative arts attesting to the nation's artistic achievement.
